Accomack inmate files Federal lawsuits against other entities and individuals

By Linda Cicoira

The Accomack Jail inmate who filed a $33 million complaint in U.S. District Court against the Accomack County Sheriff’s Office and two of its jail deputies also filed lawsuits against a long list of other officials on the Eastern Shore.

Forty-six-year-old William Parke Custis, of Seaside Road in Exmore, also asked for $33 million in damages from the Town of Exmore, two police officers from Exmore, now Retired Judge W. Revell Lewis III, Accomack Commonwealth’s Attorney Spencer Morgan, officers and medical workers at the Eastern Shore Regional Jail and the Northampton County Sheriff’s Office.

Custis claims the judge gave him a “life sentence” when he put him on indefinite probation for burglary and violating a protective order. He complained that his attorney Paul Watson, who was later disbarred, did not properly represent him and that the convictions, in that case, should be vacated. He stated that former Accomack Circuit Court Clerk Sam Cooper and Eastern Shore Regional Jail Capt. Roger Kennedy impeded his ability to file suits. He further complained was only allowed in the law library once in a year when at Accomack Jail.

He claims that was an unconstitutional search and seizure, denial of his right to a speedy trial, admission of perjured testimony, an unlawfully induced guilty plea, denial of a right to an unbiased judge, denial of the right to appeal and due process, denial of the right to free speech, having a medical conditional that prevents the formation of criminal intent, cruel and unusual punishment, and the right to a speedy trial.